


The Secrets of Longbottom Manor

by Lomonaaeren



Series: Children of the Sun [11]
Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Book 1: Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone, Familiars, Gen, Mythical Beings & Creatures
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-17
Updated: 2018-10-14
Packaged: 2019-07-13 09:39:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 8,741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16015274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lomonaaeren/pseuds/Lomonaaeren
Summary: Staying at Longbottom Manor for Christmas with his new guardian Augusta Longbottom, Harry can’t help observing some of the problems that Neville has—and trying to help.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This is part of my “Children of the Sun” series, and follows _Silver Shadow Snake_. This will be a short part that covers Christmas of Harry’s first year.

****“Are you ready, Mr. Potter?”

Harry looked up and nodded. Mrs. Longbottom held his shrunken trunk in one hand, and Neville’s in the other. Neville had tried to shrink his own and failed. Mrs. Longbottom had just sighed and muttered something about “of course” before she took over the chore herself.

Harry knew that the reason Neville failed was that he was still using his father’s wand. He had talked to Mrs. Longbottom once before about changing that, but she hadn’t listened yet.

Well, Harry had plans for that, too. It was Christmas, right? Which meant he could get people _gifts_.

On Mrs. Longbottom’s shoulder, her bronze eagle, Signora, flapped her wings and uttered a screech. Harry gave her a thoughtful look. So far, Golden hadn’t spent enough time around Mrs. Longbottom’s familiar to know if she was one of the ones that would speak to them or not. It would be interesting to find that out.

“Are you ready, Neville? Oh, honestly, you _hopeless_ boy…”

Harry looked at Neville, blinking. He wasn’t doing anything, though. He was just standing there, clutching Trevor, his silver toad familiar, in both hands and looking miserable. But apparently his hair was the problem, because Mrs. Longbottom straightened it with another sigh and a wave of her wand.

“Come on, my lord,” she said, nodding at Harry, and then began walking through King’s Cross as if she was going to make the Muggles get out of the way by sheer force of will.

Harry followed her. He could feel his face getting flushed, and Golden lifted his head and looked at Harry a little anxiously.

“Is she always like that?” he whispered to Neville, when he thought Mrs. Longbottom was far enough ahead not to hear. Signora kept looking back at them, but Harry thought that was more to make sure they didn’t get lost, not spy on them.

“Yeah. It’s just, my dad—Harry, he had a _lion_ familiar. He was a proper Gryffindor. That’s what Gran wants me to be. And I just can’t.” Neville hunched his shoulders and kept walking.

“What happened to your dad? I mean, your parents?” Harry knew that something must have happened to both of Neville’s parents if he was living with his grandmother, but he’d never heard the story.

Neville turned so sickly pale that Harry was sorry he’d asked. He reached up and let Golden twine around his wrist and from there rub his nose against Neville’s cheek. “Sorry. You don’t have to tell me.”

“Thanks, Harry,” Neville said, his head still down. “I wouldn’t mind telling you, but Gran doesn’t want me to tell anyone.”

Harry thought that was strange, but he exchanged a glance with Golden and didn’t say anything more about it. “You started to tell me about the Christmases that you had the last few years. Do you really burn a whole Yule log?”

Neville perked up and started talking, and kept it up even after they Apparated to Longbottom Manor, which Harry was grateful for. He didn’t think he could have coped with a house that large, otherwise.

*

It wasn’t just the size of the manor house that was the problem, honestly, Harry thought that night as he and Golden lay in bed in a bedroom not far from Neville’s. It was so _rich_. Harry supposed that maybe the Potters had had a house like this once, but he’d never seen it. He just didn’t grow up that way.

_I should have._

Harry sighed and turned over, nudging Golden a little, who gave him a patient look before curling up again. Honestly, he didn’t like Dumbledore much, but he was kind of happy he hadn’t grown up with the Longbottoms. _Kind_ of. He didn’t think he would be who he was now if he’d grown up here.

What if he thought people _should_ call him a lord? What if he got too used to eating off gold plates, which they’d actually done tonight? He didn’t want to be the kind of person who strutted past people because he thought having a golden familiar made him better than them.

There were shining curtains on the windows of this room, and there were too many corners that were filled with chairs and desks and tables. And there were _mirrors_ on all the walls. Harry could see needing one so that you didn’t go out with your hair dangling over your eyes, but what was the point of being reflected from every angle?

And Mrs. Longbottom and Signora just kept staring at him as if he was going to do something remarkable any second and they didn’t want to miss it.

 _She_ was silent about Neville’s parents, too. She’d asked Harry a question about the Dursleys that made Harry say how much he missed his mum and dad, and Mrs. Longbottom had immediately gone pale and dug into her food.

So Neville’s parents were dead, right? He always talked about his dad like he was. And Harry knew you wouldn’t take away a wizard’s wand and give it to another wizard unless they were dead. Some of the books he’d found in the Hogwarts library when he was looking up the possession ritual were very stern about that.

But Harry hadn’t heard anything about it. And it seemed—there was something like a _shadow_ lurking in the Manor, something that Harry didn’t connect to death. People talked about his dead parents to him all the time. Dead could be heroic. Maybe it had just been a really horrible way for Neville’s parents to die, though.

But no one had said anything about it at school, either, even when they talked about relatives who died in the war. Neville had been silent all the time and holding onto Trevor when that happened. Maybe it had just been a horrible death and Neville didn’t want to talk about it.

That was probably all it was.

Harry closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep, although it seemed as if he walked in cold shadows that night for a long time.

*

“I just don’t understand why you couldn’t have an animal other than a _toad_ for your familiar.”

“Yes, Gran.”

Harry halted outside the dining room, shocked. It was the day before Christmas, and he knew there was already a huge tree in one corner of the drawing room that he hadn’t been allowed inside yet. Mrs. Longbottom had explained that they opened all but one of their gifts that evening, and would save the biggest or most expensive one for Christmas morning. And she had told Harry in a steely tone that he _would_ be getting gifts from her.

She had seemed like such a nice woman, if stiff. Harry had known that she thought Neville was cowardly and that he should have ended up in Gryffindor, but he’d never thought that she’d go so far as to attack Trevor.

He took a step inside the dining room, and Mrs. Longbottom turned towards him with her version of a welcoming smile on her lips. “How did you sleep last night, my lord?”

“Well enough. Do you think it’s horrible that I have a snake for a familiar, Mrs. Longbottom?”

“I told you that you could call me Gran, like Neville does.”

“And I told you to call me Harry, but you don’t. Anyway, I want to know the answer. Do you think me having a serpent as a familiar is _inappropriate_?”

Mrs. Longbottom looked around as if she was trying to decide whether or not she needed to escape, but there was nowhere to go. Signora, on her shoulder, stretched her bronze wings curiously as she stared at Harry. Neville, with Trevor cradled in his hands close against his chest, was looking at Harry, too, but in astonishment.

Mrs. Longbottom finally cleared her throat and asked, “Why would it be?”

“Some people thought it was inappropriate because they thought a serpent was a sign of evil. And they thought only Slytherins should have one. And Voldemort’s familiar is a serpent, so they think I could be evil, too.”

“But that’s ridiculous! Serpent familiars are noble. And yours is _gold_. That ought to be enough to curb such stupid, chattering tongues if anything is!”

“And Neville’s familiar is silver, Mrs. Longbottom. Which means, if we go by the usual way of thinking about things, that he’s _stronger than you._ So why were you yelling at him for something he couldn’t even help, like he and Trevor are worthless?”

Neville looked as if he was going to faint. He edged over towards the wall, and Trevor stood up on his hind legs and croaked anxiously. Mrs. Longbottom just stared at Harry. Then she said, “His father was a great man.”

“So _what_? My parents were great people, too, but they would have been proud of me if I had a silver familiar, or a cockroach familiar, or a tin one! Don’t yell at Neville! I understand that you’re sad that your son died, but you can’t take it out on Neville!”

“No one in my day spoke to their elders in such an insolent tone, young man.”

“And I thought kind people didn’t talk to their grandchildren the way you talked to Neville, either, but I suppose I was wrong.”

“Remember that I am still your guardian, young man, and I can send you to your room!”

“Fine. Do it. It’s not a patch on anything that the Dursleys did to me. And that still wouldn’t make it right for you to yell at Neville, no matter _what_ kind of familiar he was born with!”

Mrs. Longbottom couldn’t seem to think of anything to say to that. Signora turned her head back and forth, but said nothing, either. Golden nuzzled up to Harry’s side, and Harry knew it was time to stop yelling at her and do something about Neville and breakfast.

“Come on, Neville,” he said, holding out his hand. “I have some Galleons. We can go to Diagon Alley and have breakfast.”

“How are you going to get there?” Mrs. Longbottom demanded. “You can’t Apparate!”

“I know how to use the Floo,” Harry said coolly. He’d used it several times when he had to go back and forth from the Ministry to Hogwarts for Dumbledore’s trial. “And if you get bad enough, there are other people who will take me in. I _wanted_ to be here. But you’re being horrible and unfair.”

“ _Harry_.” Neville’s voice was small. He looked as if he was clutching Trevor so hard now that Trevor might actually break apart in his hands.

“Am I scaring you, Neville?” Harry hoped he wouldn’t, and Neville didn’t act that scared of Harry, but after hearing the way his grandmother yelled at him, Harry understood where a lot of his problems came from now.

“Um. Not really?” Neville was glancing wildly back and forth between Harry and his grandmother as if he didn’t know what to do next.

“Good. C’mon, Nev.”

Harry walked out of the room, and there was a long moment when he honestly wasn’t sure Neville would follow, but then he straightened his shoulders and walked after Harry. He was still shaking, but not squeezing Trevor.

And Golden was slithering beside him, and Harry was sure that he would take care of any danger they got into, and that he approved of Harry and thought he was doing the right thing.

Harry found the main Floo in the fireplace where they’d sat last night, and threw powder into it. “Diagon Alley!”


	2. Part Two

“I—we can just have breakfast here?” Neville whispered as they sat down at a table in the Leaky Cauldron.

“Why not?” Harry asked, a little confused. He had enough Galleons with him from coming here on his birthday to pay for everything. He waved his hand, and Tom waved back to him, grinning, his copper magpie bowing and screeching on his shoulder. Harry walked up to the bar and asked for porridge and sausages and eggs, because he’d seen at the Hufflepuff table that Neville liked eggs.

“Here with a friend?” Tom peered at Neville, seeming to approve when he saw that Neville had a silver familiar. And he didn’t say anything about the fact that Trevor was a toad, Harry thought. He was afraid Mrs. Longbottom was a little ridiculous.

“Yes, his name’s Neville Longbottom.”

Tom whistled through his teeth, and his magpie echoed him. “Terrible what happened to his parents, terrible, terrible,” he muttered, and then tried to push the Galleons Harry handed him back. “No, Mr. Potter, I won’t take your money.”

“Is this because I have a gold familiar?” Harry asked sternly, and Golden reared up next to him, turning his head slowly from side to side as if he thought Tom needed to see the runes written on his scales.

“Well, partially,” Tom said, grinning at him. “But partially because of what you did to save us all years ago, and partially because of what happened to Mr. Longbottom’s parents. Take it back,” he added, when Harry pushed the pile of Galleons at him again.

“But I don’t want to be singled out, and Neville doesn’t like it either,” Harry added, thinking of the way that Neville didn’t even like it when Professor Sprout called on him in Herbology. He would help other students just fine, but he blushed and mumbled when they thanked him. “Can we just eat and be quiet?”

“Can’t do anything about the glances that you’re going to get because you have a gold,” Tom reminded him, although he relented and took Harry’s Galleons.

“I know, but we really do just want to eat and be quiet,” Harry said. He smiled, and Tom smiled back and turned away to cook the breakfast. Harry returned to the corner table where Neville was sitting.

“I’ve never just had breakfast in Diagon Alley without Gran being along,” Neville whispered, his eyes wide. “And never here. She thinks the Leaky Cauldron is dirty.”

“Yes, but she’s not here. And _you_ don’t think the Leaky Cauldron is dirty, do you?”

Neville shook his head and put Trevor on his shoulder. The toad was looking around with eyes as wide as his wizard’s. “No. It’s just that it seems like something we’re not supposed to do.” He spent a lot of time chewing on his lip until the food came, and his face lit up when he saw the eggs. Then he ate them and said to Harry in the middle of eating, “And Gran’s supposed to be _your_ guardian, too, you know. She’s going to be awfully angry.”

“She can get over it.”

Neville choked on his eggs, which made Harry look at him in concern. He wanted Neville to have a good Christmas because he was here, not kill himself eating breakfast. But Neville quickly shook his head to show he was okay, and sat back and drank a full glass of orange juice. “I forget that you don’t know what Gran is like,” Neville finally whispered.

“Ridiculous?” Neville choked again. Harry sighed and gave him a napkin, while Golden stole some eggs off Harry’s plate and munched them. Harry nudged Golden’s nose away with his porridge spoon. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to make you choke all the time. But she _is_ ridiculous. I understand she misses your dad, but she can’t try to make you just like him. And so _what_ if he had a lion? A toad is plenty good enough.”

“It’s just—toads are small. And they _hop_.”

Harry tried to remember if he’d heard bad things about familiars that hopped, like frogs and rabbits, but he honestly couldn’t. Professor Quirrell’s familiar was a rabbit, and it was a bad thing that she had been possessed, but no one had acted like it was a bad thing that she _hopped_. “What’s wrong with that?”

“It’s so undignified.” Neville was whispering the words into his plate while Trevor croaked with distress and tried his best to lean his face against Neville’s. “That’s what Gran would say. I should have one that walks. Or flies. Or at least swims.”

“I thought toads could swim?”

“That’s frogs.” Neville looked even more depressed for a second. He reached up and took Trevor off his shoulder and put him in his lap to feed him a glob of porridge. “And, you know, it’s not _gracefully_. Like a fish or a dolphin swims.”

Harry sighed. “Okay, but that’s just what your Gran thinks. No one in Hogwarts thinks badly of Professor Quirrell for having a rabbit familiar. Or that prefect, what’s her name, the seventh-year one in Slytherin? The one who has a kangaroo.”

“Gran would still be happier if I had a lion. Or if I was in Gryffindor.”

“But would _you_ be happier?”

Neville met Harry’s eyes and then nervously looked away again. “What are you saying?”

“That you shouldn’t let your Gran dictate what you feel about yourself and Trevor. And anyway, even if she believes in the hierarchy, she’s wrong because you would still be stronger than you are because you have a _silver_ toad. Was your dad’s lion silver?”

“No, bronze. But, Harry…” Neville trailed off and started picking at his eggs again.

“What?”

“You said the hierarchy was wrong.”

“I know, but so _many_ notions that people have about familiars are wrong,” Harry said, and nudged Golden away from his eggs again. “That doesn’t mean that your Gran is right. You have a good familiar, Neville. And after breakfast, we’re going to Ollivander’s so that I can buy you a wand for a Christmas present and you can have one that’s just your own and not your dad’s.”

Neville gaped at him, which would have been fine, except there was some chewed-up egg on his tongue and Harry didn’t really want to look at it. He coughed a little, and Neville promptly shut his mouth and swallowed, but he was already shaking his head. “Harry—you can’t buy me a wand. That’s not the kind of thing friends buy for each other!”

“Sure, but since your Gran is my guardian right now, that sort of makes me your foster brother, right? And I bet that family members buy each other wands. Your Gran should have brought you one already, but she was too busy wanting you to be your dad.” Harry tapped Golden sternly on the nose as he tried to eat more eggs. Golden curled back and gave him a sulky look. Harry wouldn’t have minded, but he hadn’t had many eggs himself.

Neville didn’t say anything. Harry glanced at him and was surprised to see him blinking back tears.

“Neville? It’s okay, you don’t have to think of me as your brother if you don’t want to.”

“No, I just—I never had a brother. I always wanted one. Gran kept telling me that my Mum and Dad would have had other kids if they were—” Neville swallowed noisily. “It’s just that you’re my friend, and you don’t care about the fact that Trevor’s a toad, and you’re so—you’re golden and you still talk with me like I’m your equal—”

“You would be my friend even if you weren’t my brother. You’re just as important as I am.” Harry thought of telling Neville what Tom had said about wanting to give them breakfast for free, but he decided that wouldn’t make Neville feel better right now. “Anyway, I’m buying you your new wand unless you really don’t want me to.”

“I want a new wand,” Neville whispered. “I just don’t want you to have to spend your money to buy it.”

“It’s my money, I’ll do what I like with it,” Harry said, and that finally pulled a watery smile from Neville. They finished breakfast quickly, so that they could go on their way to Ollivander’s.

And Golden managed to steal a lot more eggs than Harry wanted him to, too.

*

“Mr. Potter? Has something happened to your wand?”

“No, sir. It’s just that my friend and foster brother Neville needs one of his own.” Harry pulled Neville into the shop when he hesitated outside, maybe because he thought Mr. Ollivander looked strange.

Mr. Ollivander chuckled and reached up to touch the antennae of his familiar. It was a large moth that sat on his shoulder and seemed to be watching everything, although its eyes were too small for Harry to be sure where they pointed. And the color of the moth was strange, too, a soft grey that sometimes seemed to be tin and sometimes seemed to be silver. “Ah, Mr. Longbottom. I thought to see you long since.”

Neville gulped. “I-it was my Gran, sir. She thought I could use my father’s wand.” He held it out.

Mr. Ollivander picked it up and held it in front of his familiar, who reared on delicate legs and reached out to lay a fuzzy wing against the wood. “No, no, not suited to you at all,” Mr. Ollivander muttered. “Well, Mr. Longbottom, what struggles do you have with the wand?”

“It doesn’t seem to cast right most of the time,” Neville said. He’d relaxed a little, Harry was glad to see. “And sometimes it does, but the spell is pretty weak.”

“Yes, yes, I can see.” Mr. Ollivander ran his hand up and down the wand, then nodded decisively and put it on the counter. His familiar took flight and hovered above the wand, scattering what Harry thought was wing-dust down with each beat. “The wand is a little suited to you, Mr. Longbottom, in that it embodies some of the qualities that your _true_ wand will have. But you cannot continue using it. A travesty that you have been.”

Neville tried to curl up, but Trevor croaked and Harry put a comforting hand on his shoulder. “He doesn’t mean _you’re_ a travesty, Neville. Just that your grandmother shouldn’t have pressured you to use that wand.”

“Of course that is what I meant,” Mr. Ollivander said, but absently. He was busy dragging boxes of wands out of the stacks. “Now, Mr. Longbottom, you are suited to a wand that is protective and safeguards innocence. Try this one—”

This time, Harry got to watch someone else try wands, and it was actually fascinating. Neville seemed to stand up a little more with each wand that was wrong, as if that was actually reassuring to him that you _couldn’t_ just get the right wand by giving someone a random one and hoping it worked. Mr. Ollivander removed the wands with a small smile that also made Neville smile back.

Harry almost thought he knew the right wand before Mr. Ollivander did, given the way that Golden suddenly swayed and Trevor stared at the pale brown length of wood before Neville gripped it. Suddenly he sighed, and gave it a strong, confident wave Harry had never seen from him before. Soft silver sparks spiraled up from the wand’s tip and hovered beautifully for a second against the ceiling, then dissipated.

Mr. Ollivander nodded. “That is your wand, Mr. Longbottom. Rowan wood with a core of unicorn hair. Powerful protections against evil magic, with a core of innocence. Were your parents not in St. Mungo’s, how they would rejoice.”

Harry stared for a second. Then he said, “But, Mr. Ollivander, Neville’s parents are dead.”

Neville’s shoulders hunched. Mr. Ollivander peered at him with pale eyes and said, “Perhaps I should have left your friend to tell you, but I did not know that you did not know.”

Harry glanced at Neville. Neville just met his eyes and mouthed desperately, _Not here._ He was clutching his wand with one hand and Trevor with the other, so Harry knew he must be stressed.

Harry swallowed and turned to Mr. Ollivander. “Thank you for letting us come in and get the wand, sir. I’m paying for it.”

“Somehow I thought you might,” Mr. Ollivander said, and held out his hand for the coins. Harry put the seven Galleons in his hand, and started a little as Mr. Ollivander leaned down to whisper to him.

“Go gently, but you must hear this.”

Ollivander was gone, moving into the back of the shop with his strange-colored moth on his shoulder, before Harry could ask him why. He turned to Neville and shook his head. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.”

Neville shivered and then lifted his chin. “No, I have to. I should have done it right away, but—that’s the way things are around Gran. She said we weren’t going to, so I didn’t.”

“Is it a shameful thing?”

“No. It’s a horrible thing.”

Harry reached out and squeezed Neville’s shoulder. “Then let’s go back to the Leaky Cauldron and get a room so we can talk without anyone hearing that you don’t want to.”


	3. Part Three

“You see, my parents…”

Neville trailed off. Harry remained quiet, sitting next to him. They were in Florean Fortescue’s, with ices melting in front of them. Harry had ordered them because he thought it might make Neville feel better, but Golden and Trevor had eaten more of the ices so far than Neville had.

Golden tried to budge up again. Harry curled an arm around his neck and held him back while he looked calmly at Neville.

“I know that something terrible happened to them,” Harry said, when Neville paused yet again. “You don’t have to tell me all the details. Just the ones that you think matter the most.”

“Okay. Okay.” Neville offered his melting bowl to Trevor and then stared at his familiar while he spoke. “My parents were in hiding for a while. But they came out a day after you defeated Voldemort.” Harry just nodded, not saying anything about how he might not have done that for right now. “Then the Lestranges came.”

“I’m sorry,” Harry said, when the silence had settled over the table for a while. “I don’t know who they are.”

Neville gaped at him for a second. Then he nodded. “Sorry, Harry. I keep forgetting that you grew up away from the wizarding world.” He shivered. “They were some of the worst Death Eaters.”

Harry nodded. He could picture them. “What did they do?”

“I think they were going to k-kill my parents…” Neville trailed off and closed his eyes. A few tears made their way down his cheeks. Harry got out his handkerchief, and Neville sniffled and wiped his face.

“Thanks,” he whispered. “They were going to k-kill them, I think. Eventually. But they tort-tortured their familiars first. My dad had a bronze lion, I told you that. Gestalt. And my mum had a copper swan. She was called Galena. The Lestranges—they—they forced Gestalt and Galena to get close to my mum and dad…”

Harry just waited. He had no idea what was coming next. That _was_ partly because he had grown up away from the wizarding world, and partly because he didn’t know a lot about torture.

He knew he would know more about it when Neville finished talking.

“They tortured G-Galena and Gestalt until they were almost dead. Then they sh-shoved them into my parents’ souls.”

Harry shuddered just imagining it. Golden pressed close against him, but he wasn’t trying to get at Harry’s ice this time. Harry stroked Golden’s neck and didn’t hide his face against it. Neville was crying harder now, but he didn’t make a sound.

Harry got up and went to get some more napkins. Fortescue nodded at him while his tin llama knelt to Golden. “That young lad all right, then?”

“He’ll be all right. But can I have some more napkins, sir?”

` “You don’t need to ask.”

Harry just smiled uncomfortably back, and took the napkins. He went back to Neville and handed them all across the table in an enormous fistful. Neville blew his nose and slumped against his chair. Trevor croaked as he was almost crushed.

“Sorry, Trevor,” Neville whispered. He shifted Trevor until he was sitting on the ridge of Neville’s shoulder, above the back of his chair.

“Thanks, Harry,” Neville finally said. “So they at-attached Galena and Gestalt to my parents’ souls. Familiars are supposed to be _separate_ from you. Not inside you like that. They’re right next to you, but they always have their own bodies and their own magic. My p-parents went mad. Galena and Gestalt went m-mad. No one could unattach them. My mum and dad are in St. Mungo’s. They’ve been there for ten years. My dad looks like a werelion who can’t shapeshift all the way. My mum has a swan’s eyes and beak and wings. They don’t know me. They can’t t-talk or use magic. They can’t even _die_ , I don’t think. Familiars are supposed to turn into sparks when their wizard or witch dies, you know? But they can’t, because no one can break the bond between their souls.”

Harry couldn’t breathe for a second. But he knew it was a lot worse for Neville, so he got up and went around the table and hugged him.

Neville hugged back for a second, hard. Then he leaned away and brushed his tears off and sniffled. “I d-don’t want you to get in t-trouble.”

“You mean with your Gran?” Harry shook his head. “I’m not worried about that. I mean, I sort of understand why she wanted to keep this secret, and she must be really upset about your mum and dad. But that doesn’t mean she gets to treat you like she does.”

“I mean for hugging me in public.”

Harry stared at him, then stared around. There was no one but them in Fortescue’s, because it was so early, and maybe because it was so close to Christmas. “Someone would get upset because I’m a boy hugging a boy?” He’d heard Uncle Vernon say something about that once.

“No. Because people with silver familiars aren’t s-supposed to touch people with gold ones without permission.”

“Then I’ll just say that I started it. And I’ll make sure that no one thinks you did anything wrong, Neville.”

Neville hiccoughed for a second and then whispered, “I don’t understand. You have lots of people with silver familiars you know. It’s not that—why are you my friend? Is it just because we’re in Hufflepuff together?”

Harry went back to his seat, because he thought hugging Neville right now would just make it harder for Neville to listen to him. “No. It’s because you’re brave and loyal and smart and you’re friendly and you agree with me about the hierarchy needing to change. It’s all those things, Neville.” It was hard for him to explain. Until he came to the wizarding world, Golden had been his only friend. And Golden was his friend because he had always been there.

“ _And you are my wizard_ ,” Golden said softly.

Harry hugged his neck and watched as Neville sat there and stared at him. Then Neville said, “I’m _brave_?”

Harry nodded. “I didn’t even realize how much you were until I heard you talk about your parents. Neville, I would be upset every day if that happened to my parents. But you just put up with it.”

“I think about it all the time.”

“I know you do. But you still go out and live your life. You can even be quiet about it if you want. It’s incredible.”

Neville was blushing by now, so Harry went back to fighting Golden for his ice. Finally, Neville said, “And my familiar’s color and the fact that he’s a toad don’t matter at all to you?”

“Why should it?”

“Because it does to everybody else!”

“I don’t think it matters to Ron or Hermione or Cormac.” Harry thought, then added, “And maybe not Draco, either. I don’t know, I think Draco says stupid things sometimes, but I don’t think he always believes them. And Professor Snape was picking on you, but that was because he didn’t like the way you acted in Potions, not because he thinks that your familiar is ridiculous.”

“I think it was.”

“Well, okay. But he’s better now, isn’t he?”

Neville nodded hesitantly. He still sometimes acted like he expected Professor Snape to explode at him instead of a potion, but Harry knew it was better than it had been. And because Neville wasn’t so jumpy, Professor Snape didn’t get as upset at him, either. “But there are lots of people who would still think that having a toad for a familiar is stupid, even if he _isn’t_ stupid.”

“Who told you that?” Harry asked him quietly.

Neville thought about it, and Harry winced when he saw his face fell, mainly because it fell so hard. “Gran did.”

“I’ve never heard anyone say toads are bad,” Harry told him. “But even if some people think that, you can’t change Trevor’s shape. He _needs_ to be that shape. Golden told me that. The shapes matter for the lives the familiars have right now. And if your grandmother is upset about that, that’s her problem.”

Neville’s eyes widened, and then he choked out a little laugh. “You’re the only one who could get away with saying that to her.”

Harry shook his head, smiling. “I don’t necessarily _want_ to get away with saying that to her. I’ll try to think of something softer. But she needs to realize that you’re your own person, not your dad. And that having a silver toad isn’t bad. And that you needed a new wand.”

Neville hesitated before he pulled his wand out of his pocket. “She might try to take it away when she sees it.”

“So keep it out of sight if you want until we go back to Hogwarts.” If it was Harry, he would have used it, but there were lots of reasons why Neville wasn’t him. “And now, should we go back and face her? I’ll do all the talking if you want. I’ll tell her that you told me about your mum and dad. I’ll say whatever you want me to say if it’s not that, though.”

Neville looked pale, but quiet, not upset. He finally said, “Tell her that I told you about Mum and Dad. And then say whatever else you need to say. Even tell her about my new wand, if you have to. But I don’t want to be in the room.”

Harry smiled at him. “I do think honesty is the best. Thanks, Neville.”

*

“If you’re going to punish us because we want to Diagon Alley, then I’m the one you should punish, not Neville.”

Mrs. Longbottom narrowed her eyes at him. She was sitting in a huge drawing room that Harry hadn’t seen before. All the curtains were gold, and the furniture was yellow—not made of gold, to Harry’s relief—and there were photographs on the walls and the mantel and the tables and the shelves of a young boy and a young man with a bronze lion next to him. Harry marched up to her and stood in front of her.

Signora rattled her wings warningly on Mrs. Longbottom’s shoulder. Harry ignored Signora. If she did decide she had to attack, then Golden would stop her.

“What did you want in Diagon Alley?”

“Breakfast. And to get Neville a new wand. And Neville finally told me about his parents.”

Mrs. Longbottom stared at him in what Harry thought was probably shock. Harry nodded to her. He had some sympathy for her. She had to be wondering what else could possibly go wrong.

“I understand why you’re so upset about his father,” Harry told her softly. “Being trapped between life and death _is_ horrible. But you can’t make Neville feel better by blaming him and yelling at him. And his familiar isn’t wrong or stupid. It’s the right familiar for who Neville is. And he’s not who his father was.”

“What would you understand about it? You came out of the war with honorably dead parents and fame that—” Mrs. Longbottom stopped speaking and stared at the wall. “No one ever remembers Frank and Alice.”

Harry stared at the floor for a second, because he was _really_ angry. Yeah, he was lucky his parents were dead. So lucky.

But Golden wrapped himself gently around Harry’s neck, and Harry looked up and went on. “Well, maybe you need to talk about them more. Then maybe people would remember them.”

“I will mourn my son and daughter-in-law in my own way!”

“That’s fine. But if you keep taking out that anger on Neville, it doesn’t help him. It doesn’t help you. It doesn’t help people remember who got tortured. Are you going to be angry and mean to him anymore?”

“That boy has potential, but he won’t live up to it! Frank was a Gryffindor. Neville needs to be—”

“I heard someone say something once,” Harry said. He’d been cleaning in the kitchen, and the telly had been on, but Dudley had fallen asleep in front of it, so he hadn’t changed it to another programme that would have been more to his liking. It had sounded like a wise old man was talking in the one the telly was on. “It was about real things. He said you can close your eyes and wish as hard as you want, but when you open your eyes, real things are still there.”

Mrs. Longbottom stared at him.

“If you need to be angry all the time, that’s fine. If you don’t take it out on Neville, though. I’m going to get in the way when you take it out on Neville. And I’m going to spend all the summers and holidays with him from now on, because he’s my foster brother. Unless you decide that I need to go somewhere else.” Harry felt his chest tighten as he spoke. He was still afraid she would kick him out. But he had to do this.

Mrs. Longbottom jumped to her feet. “What, no! Of course not! But what makes my Neville worthy of being friends with you?”

Her face was bright and worried now. Harry was glad, because at least he thought she really did love Neville when she looked like that. “Because he’s loyal and brave and kind and a _good_ person. He doesn’t need to be in Gryffindor or have a lion familiar for that.”

Mrs. Longbottom reached up to literally smooth down Signora’s feathers. She asked a question next that Harry hadn’t thought she would ask. “What did Ollivander say when he gave Neville a new wand?”

“He said that it would work well for him.”

“And his father’s wand?”

“Didn’t work well for him.”

Mrs. Longbottom closed her eyes. Harry waited, but she didn’t say anything else. He turned and left the grave room.

He thought things would change from now on. He hoped they would have a happy Christmas and Mrs. Longbottom could treat Neville differently.

But he would be right there to change things if they _didn’t_ happen differently.


	4. Part Four

“Harry, wake up! It’s Christmas morning!”

Harry opened his eyes, and blinked at Neville. Then he grinned. He almost hadn’t recognized him at first. Neville’s face was glowing with a big, bright smile. Harry didn’t think he’d _ever_ seen him look like that.

“And look!” Neville thrust his wand out in front of him. There was a bright sparkle burning on the end, and as Harry watched, it leaped off and traced a looping circle around the room. Trevor croaked, and Golden slithered down from Harry’s bed to loop his neck and follow the spiral.

“That’s a spell people use to get their familiars to exercise. I could never do it before.”

“Good for you, Neville,” Harry told his friend. “I’ll get dressed and come right down. Are we having breakfast first, or opening presents, or what?”

“Breakfast first. In the formal dining room.” Neville rolled his eyes, and Harry laughed. He didn’t think Neville would have done _that_ a few days ago either. “Gran insists. But it’s a huge breakfast, and it has all my favorite food! Did you tell the house-elves what you wanted so they could make it for you?”

“Oh, _that’s_ why that house-elf popped up in my bedroom last night! Yeah, I did.”

Neville grinned. “Good. Then there’ll probably be lots of treacle tart.” He laughed and retreated out the bedroom door while Harry looked around for a big soft pillow to throw at him.

Harry got dressed in a pair of comfortable green robes that he’d bought in Diagon Alley when he and Hagrid first went there in the summer, and then went downstairs. He remembered the way to the formal dining room, but _that_ was almost unrecognizable when he stepped into it, too.

“Happy Christmas, Mr. Potter.”

Mrs. Longbottom was sitting at the head of the table with Signora on a perch next to her. She looked uncomfortable, but also like she wasn’t going to scold Neville. Harry beamed at her and said, “Happy Christmas!” Then he sat down at the chair that was already pulled out for him, looking curiously at the chair next to him. He didn’t see any people in the room other than him and Mrs. Longbottom and Neville.

“I thought your familiar might want a chair for the Christmas feast.”

Harry beamed even harder at her. “He’d like that, thank you, Mrs. Longbottom.” He patted the chair, and Golden climbed up the leg and draped himself across the cushion. That put his face right up next to the feast of eggs and sausages and treacle tart and ham, which was what crowded this part of the table. Golden’s tongue darted out eagerly, and he looked as if he would bite into the ham any second.

“Wait. Be polite,” Harry told him, and Golden twisted his neck but put his tongue back in his mouth.

Neville was sitting across from him, with Trevor in front of a small plate that was covered with squirming worms and insects. “Gran is going to make a toast,” he told Harry, just as three silver goblets popped into being on the table, one near each of the humans’ plates.

“I do this every year,” Mrs. Longbottom said, picking up her goblet. Harry picked his up and looked curiously into it. It was a steaming, sweet-smelling drink that was amber in color. He thought it might be mulled cider. “And usually, my toast is the same every year.” She paused.

Neville had tensed up again. Harry narrowed his eyes. _I hope she isn’t going to say that her toast is to hope Neville gets more magic, or anything like that._

“This time, I have a new toast to make.” Mrs. Longbottom lifted her goblet high. For a second, Harry thought there were snakes twisting around the edges of it, and then realized they were just circular patterns of jewels. _Stop seeing snakes in everything,_ he chided himself, and picked up his own goblet.

“To Harry Potter, who has brought new magic into our lives that was much needed.” Mrs. Longbottom’s face was serious, like she wasn’t joking. “And to my grandson Neville, who is growing up.”

She raised the goblet higher still. Harry strained to get his as high; Neville, who was a little taller than him, had an easier time. Which the goblets more or less formed a triangle, there was a sharp chiming note, like they’d all managed to clink them together.

“Thank you,” Mrs. Longbottom said to Harry. “You made me rethink some things that I would never have thought of if not for you.” She tipped her goblet back and drank deep.

Harry, amazed, hardly tasted the drink for a second, and then he coughed a little. Yeah, it was hot cider.

He put down the cup and began to scoop various things onto his plate. Neville, his eyes huge, handed him the same plate of cut potatoes twice, and Harry grinned at him and held onto it for a second before he passed it back. He could see why Neville would be stunned.

Things had _changed_. Harry hadn’t expected that to happen, not so soon. But he was glad it had. It meant that he might have a chance to change other things, and make Mrs. Longbottom an ally, instead of an enemy.

And he might not have to leave and find some other place to live, after all. That would be welcome.

*

“These are for you, Harry.”

Harry darted a glance at Mrs. Longbottom, but she was serious as she waved her wand and a huge pile of gifts floated towards him. “I—you didn’t need to do all this for me,” he said.

“I didn’t do _all_ of it.” Mrs. Longbottom inclined her head in the same way Signora did, and her face was fierce and her nose looked like an eagle’s beak. “Some of them are from your friends at Hogwarts, and some are from Neville, and some are from anonymous well-wishers. I’ve made sure that none of them contained anything harmful.”

Harry shook his head in wonder. He just hadn’t thought she would do that for him. “Thank you, Mrs. Longbottom.”

Mrs. Longbottom darted a glance at him, but didn’t say anything. She let Harry open his gifts, and Neville, while she sipped hot chocolate and watched them.

Harry had _books_. So many books! Apparently those people who didn’t really know him well and just thought they should send gifts to someone with a gold familiar mostly chose books. There were histories of magic, and histories of goblin wars, and histories of wars with the Muggles. There were books on curses and hexes and how to make wards and how to brew potions. There were handsome blank journals for writing in, and books about laws, and children’s fairy tales, and “common knowledge” books on things like how familiars came to be and how Apparition worked.

Golden leaned over Harry’s shoulder as he opened ones of the books about familiars. He darted his tongue in amusement. Harry chuckled and patted his head.

“What is it?” Mrs. Longbottom asked, leaning forwards.

“Golden is just amused at some of the things wizards believe about familiars,” Harry said, tucking away the book. “They’re not true.”

“If they were not true, would not familiars have told us before this?”

Harry gave her a thoughtful look. “Some people don’t want to listen to familiars. Others don’t want to talk to their wizards. I think it helps that I’m a Parselmouth, and Golden wants to make sure that I don’t do stupid things with my power. We talk to each other a lot.”

Mrs. Longbottom’s jaw clenched for a moment. “I see. What is one of the things that we get wrong?”

“That familiars are always the same from life to life,” Harry said, opening one of Neville’s presents. It was a tiny glass box filled with soil, with a little pouch of seeds next to it, and written instructions. Harry beamed at him. “Like a garden that I can keep on the table next to my bed? Thanks, Neville!”

Neville smiled at him and opened a box of chocolates that it looked like Cedric Diggory had got him.

“From life to _life_?”

“Yes, familiars reincarnate,” Harry sad, and frowned at the book that Hermione had got him. When he flipped through it, it looked like it was blank except for a line that ran all across the middle of all the pages. He would have to ask her what it was for. Very short journal entries, maybe? “And sometimes they’re silver, and sometimes gold, and sometimes tin, and so on. It has to do with what their wizards need in those lives. That’s what Golden says, anyway.”

Mrs. Longbottom was quiet. Harry opened more gifts, laughing when he saw the one Ron had got him: a small pamphlet designed to persuade people to play Quidditch. Ron always wished that Harry was more interested in Quidditch than he was.

Harry just didn’t know when he would have _time_. Keeping up with classwork and helping people and listening to familiars and testifying in Dumbledore’s trial and the Dursleys’ trial had eaten up all his time this term.

“Then one familiar might be silver in one lifetime and tin in another?” Mrs. Longbottom whispered finally.

“Yes.” Harry eyed a heavy package in black paper. It was so square that he wondered if it was a stack of books. He kind of hoped not. The tag said it was from Professor Snape, and Harry hated to think of the professor spending all that money on him.

“I had never heard of this.”

“Not many people have.” Harry snapped the string on the package and opened it. It turned out to be a box after all, a heavy ebony one that Harry sat admiring for a minute. There was a complex lock on the front of it. He turned it around and saw that it had a note on it. He turned the note so he could look at it.

_This box will keep safe anything that you put into it. It belonged to your mother, who left it in my guardianship after we had our falling-out. Press your thumb to the lock and allow it to take a drop of blood and a scale from Golden._

Harry stared in wonder. Well, he hadn’t thought Professor Snape had anything like that. He’d have to talk to him about his mum. Harry didn’t know a lot about her other than her name and that she was pretty and kind and had a silver dolphin named Serena for a familiar. He probably knew more about Aunt Petunia than he did about his own mum. That was kind of depressing. He put the box gently aside.

He opened the last gift. This one was from Mrs. Longbottom. Harry turned his head a little to the side to look at it, and Golden turned his with Harry. It was a book, but it looked like an old one. It had a rising sun on the front, and the title, with no author listed, said, _The Mechanics of Power._

“Thank you, Mrs. Longbottom. But what is it?”

Mrs. Longbottom grunted a little and stood up from her chair, holding her arm out so that Signora flapped to it from her perch. “It’s the collected wisdom of a fifteenth-century witch called Cassandra Black. She had a golden familiar—a bull—and she was something of a seer. She looked for Muggle wisdom to include in the book as well. You’ll need it if you intend to be involved in political reform.”

Harry blinked a little, then nodded, and glanced over in time to see Neville open the gift his grandmother had got _him_. Neville’s mouth hung a little open. Harry thought the gardening gloves he pulled out of the box were very nice, but they didn’t look hideously expensive.

“Gran?” Neville whispered.

“You’re not your father,” Mrs. Longbottom said abruptly, her fingers rubbing back and forth on her elbow. Signora dipped her beak and made soft yelping noises, nibbling at her witch’s fingers. “I should have seen that long since. He’s not coming back. You’re good at Herbology. You’ll be a good gardener. Seems a shame not to give you those things you need to be good at it.”

Neville sniffled a little, and Trevor opened his mouth but made no sound. Mrs. Longbottom swept out of the room. “Lunch!” she called commandingly over her shoulder.

Harry leaned towards Neville again. “Your grandmother never supported you being good at plants?”

Neville sniffled again and wiped some tears from his eyes. “No. She said I had to be good at Transfiguration and Charms and Defense like my dad.” He gave Harry a shaky smile. “She hasn’t changed all the way, maybe, but she’s changed a little. That’s good, right?”

“It’s wonderful,” Harry said, and then he wrapped his arm around his foster brother’s shoulders, letting Trevor jump up on his arm, and Golden tapped his body against both their legs to let them know he was there. “Come on, I want to eat lunch.”

“Happy Christmas, Harry.”

The whisper was so soft that Harry thought he wouldn’t have heard it if he was a few centimeters further away. He smiled. “Happy Christmas, Neville.”

 **The End**.


End file.
